December 27, 2017

Christmas was good. I went home to NOLA and stayed there for almost a week. Tammy and Alex, plus Momo, picked me up
at the airport. They arrived around the same time I did. We did a foodie tour of the West Bank. We started at Tan Dinh,
then to Hong Kong Market, a kho bo place, and Hi-Do Bakery. My mom is not a fan of those places, but we were.
The jumbo yellow egg rolls at Tan Dinh were a bit different. Hi-Do had some pretty good pastries, especially the
almond croissant. I baked sugar cookies, banana bread, and carrot cake for the Nguyen family. I didn't have the patience
to watch the twins as they decorated the sugar cookies so I delegated that responsibility to Addison. Addison did
very well keeping an eye on the boys. I hung out with Andrew and Tino. We never made it out. We stayed back at Andrew's.
We visited my uncle in New Orleans East. We had lunch at Dong Phuong and stocked up on their meat pies. I didn't go
to church on Christmas. That's two years in a row! I flew back to OKC on Christmas day and made it just in time for the
Bullard party. Chris had to go into the hospital, so Paul switched places with his mom and Tess. His mom went back to
the hospital to relieve Paul. Jim was blazin like never before. It was pretty funny. I have been taking it easy
since I got back. I didn't leave the house yesterday and I'm not sure about leaving the house today either. I have a
fridge fully stocked with my mom's food as well as leftovers from Christmas night.

December 15, 2017

Today is my last day of work before I go on a 2-week holiday. I can't remember the last time I took off two weeks
at a time. I think in my days at NYU, I took the two weeks off but since coming to OKC, I haven't done the long stretch.
For yesterday's breakfast, I ate a whole banh mi that Marci left in the fridge. I was going to save it for lunch
but was too hungry to let it sit there. Lucky for me, Tess couldn't come to the OKC Chamber Lunch so I went in her
place. The lunch was okay, but it was great to hear from the guest speaker. He was the actor from Cheers. He had a lot
to say about learning to fix things and problem solve as opposed to playing video games all day. Also, our elected
officials need to learn how to assemble an Ikea coffee table to demonstrate their ability to get things done.
If they fail at assembling an Ikea piece, they should immediately resign. I can only imagine Trump getting frustrated
at reading the instructions...the instructions are not even written out in any language. Ikea draws diagrams as their
instructions to make them universal. I need to get through today and whatever I cannot finish at the office today
can wait until I get back. Hold all my calls.

December 12, 2017

Stephanie from my office brought a tray of homemade holiday desserts. Apparently, her husband's family gets together
every year to make and bake holiday treats together. She brought about 30 different treats for us to try. We really
don't need the toffee and chocolate candy gift basket from the mothership. The homemade treats are all we need.
Tess and I went for drinks at El Chico before Noah's performance at Von Maur. We missed his first song but arrived
just in time for his second song. After his performance, we ate at BJ's. The health food kick has started and will
continue through the holidays. My goal is to eat samplings of food as opposed to eating the whole thing. This allows
me to taste the food, yet not feel guilty about eating way more than I need.

December 11, 2017

Devon really does take care of me. I also keep up with my end of the bargain
by doing my reviews and staying active. It's a win-win situation for both parties. Katy, you need to step up your
game. I'm not sure how you can get in front of the crowd but I bet you can do it. Taylor, we need to restrict that
photo album to those who already have it at this point. Chang needs to contribute as well. I'm sure she has a few
in her album to share. The murder mystery dinner was fun. I think the host blew it for us when he introduced us to
the actors. We were supposed to not know anyone at the party other than the folks who invited us. Anyways, it was
a fun night and we ended it after the dinner. It was good running into Jay and Lauren. The next day, we met up at
Aurora for an early brunch to celebrate Suzanne's birthday and retirement from the school system. I am always a fan
of Aurora and it's good to know they take reservations for a big group. We took Carrie back to her car downtown. We
went by Super Cao Nguyen to pick up snacks and rice. We never made it to the mall as originally intended. I baked
snickerdoodle cookies for the Christmas party. The Greens came over for game night, but we ended up watching "Girls
Trip". The next day, Paul picked up a few things from Plenty...he actually bought a lot of things. I picked up
Tess to go to the Christmas party. We said hello to our queens for the upcoming year and planned out which songs
they will perform at the state pageant. I came back to the house and continued on with our Mad Men binge watching
extravaganza. We are on season 5 now. The show had a total of 6 seasons. Don Draper continues to cheat on his wife.

December 8, 2017

Happy Birthday, Chi Chinh! I have another week to go before it's down time!

December 7, 2017

December 6, 2017

I am halfway through this week and I have another week of work. After that, I am home free. I am going to see
about moving my airfare up so I won't have to arrive late into MSY. Welcome back Taylor! Yes, someone was
in your Skype for Business account. You better keep your stuff on lockdown! Last night, I had leftovers for dinner.
Paul found what he could find in the fridge and pantry for his meal. Kaci never made it over for some holiday
snickerdoodle. Just add food coloring paste or gel to your cookie dough to add that festive color to your cookies. It's
pretty easy. You'll need to knead the cookie dough a bit. It won't take long for the color to mix into the dough.
Place plastic wrap on your working surface so the dough doesn't stick. Don't worry about fully mixing in the color.
You'll create this awesome marble pattern in the dough. The color will eventually mix into the dough when you bake
the cookies. If they don't, it's still nice to have that hint of marbling in your cookies. The red ones almost look
like raw meat.

December 5, 2017

December 4, 2017

Thank you, Sarah, for hosting an awesome meet and greet with our next governor of Oklahoma. Drew is going to get
Oklahoma out of a budget deficit slump and get businesses to come to Oklahoma. We cannot rely on the old oil and
gas economy anymore. Fallon continues to cut education funding to appease the powerful oil and gas. After the fundraiser,
we were off to the Thunder game thanks to Kevin. We spotted Candi and Don in their seats from up above. At half time,
we made our way down to their seats. On Saturday, we had quite a bit of errands to do including waiting up to two hours
for an estate sale. Sharon walked away with an awesome game table set. We stopped at VZD's for lunch and to watch
some of the conference championship game. We stopped at Chase Bank, dropped of Sharon, and visited the vintage
furniture store near Target. Then we were off to North Pole City, at Home,
and Mathis Brothers to return stuff. All three places accepted our returns with no problems. Well, Mathis Brothers
had a bit of a hiccup, but it was in our favor. Then we were off to Cristi and Zack's to pick up our wreath and garland.
We hung up the greenery and raked leaves. I think that was the extent of Saturday's outing. Blain and Tess came over to hang
out. We didn't really cook dinner, but grazed on snacks. The next morning, we ran into Brian and Carrie at Cafe 501
for breakfast. We met up with Tess to do some last minute shopping for her engagement photo shoot. We went with them
on the photo shoot, which was amazing by the way. They will definitely have a tough time picking out photos for
the announcement. Then it was off to Plenty to pick up the Holiday Home Tour tickets in Mesta Park. We did the home
tour and ran into a few folks. Chick N Beer was right after the home tour to get some energy flowing. Carrie needed
help with tree lighting so we visited with her, but we didn't really help other than hanging with Benny. Paul got a
quick nap in before "A Christmas Carol". The show was surprisingly good. The production value was there for sure.
We thought we got a great parking spot but it was the parking lot for the theater's administrative offices. We had
McDonald's after the show. It was our last McDonald's meal as we embark on a health cleanse!

December 1, 2017

December is here guys! This year has gone by pretty fast. I think as we get older, time goes by a lot faster than
if you were a kid. For some reason, you are always going from one point to another. You have obligations.
You have responsibilities. Kids really don't have these. They rely on their parents or responsible guardians to
take the lead on these things. When you are dressed nicely and your hair looks great, confidence
takes over and you look forward to the day ahead. You add a little pep in your step. We hung out with Ben last
night so his parents and Noah can go to the OU basketball game. Sharon and Chris came over to help.
We took shifts eating to hang out with Ben. I didn't think we had enough food so what do I do? I ordered eggrolls
and crab rangoon from China King. You can't beat China King. Their stuff is good every single time. Ben was super
easy to watch. He was on play mode the entire time. He was knocked out right at his bedtime. There were no complaints other
than the one loud scream as Sharon put him down. We like to think the Williams house is haunted but not really sure.
There was a loud noise, a bag of ornaments dropped onto the ground, and Ben's bedroom door was left wide open
even though we thought it closed. Rose was also very good. She just needed some good lovin. Poor thing was thirsty
all night long. I refilled her water bowl and she licked up all of the water immediately. Good luck with your move
to San Francisco, Chuck! Onto the next phase of your life as you kill the techie world on the west coast.